Bottomless Cauldron
by Clementive
Summary: It was her ambition, her family's crest, and the snake hissing in her mind that defined her as a Slytherin. And her rivalries with the other houses. Ino-centric. Harry Potter!AU


_**Summary: It was her ambition, her family's crest, and the snake hissing in her mind that defined her as Slytherin. And her rivalries with the other houses. Ino-centric. Harry Potter!AU.**_

_**Ino is easily one of my favourite characters. Honestly, I think she would fit in all the houses. So, here you go. Huehuehuehue I had fun! Enjoy, you guys! ^_^**_

* * *

**Hufflepuff**

"Leave her alone!"

She moved instinctively, her rage, white-hot, seizing her, controlling her.

Ino stepped in front of the pink-haired girl, the snake in her mind hissing, spinning in a closely knitted circle: '_What are you doing?_'.

The girl behind Ino whimpered, holding her ripped uniform in shaking hands.

The train shook and turned, darkening trees obstructing, blurring the view of the scenery outside. Unstable shadows flickered across her face. Compartments' door rolled shut, softly and harshly, the other students not interfering as she faced the five boys alone.

Behind her, the girl panted thickly.

"Ah, and who would you be? Blond hair, blue eyes, could you be-"

"I'm a Slytherin, that's what the sorting hat will say," Ino said hotly more to herself than the boys exchanging looks, and she readjusted her wand in her shaking clenched fist. "So, know, I'll crush you if you don't leave her alone."

Her lips curled back into a snarl. She held up her wand, her wrist flicking so that the boys would take a step back.

The leader of the boys smirked and shrugged, holding up his hands.

"See, I'm not sure you're a Slytherin," he shook his head and looked at his friends drawing uneasy laughter from them. "We just don't like Mudblood here," he sneered. "Maybe you are one yourself?"

"Mudblood..." Ino tasted the word for the first time, and she spat it, her snarl deepening the curve of her mouth. "That's an insult for the likes of you... Five against one, really? You're mud."

Without another word, Ino spun on her heels and grabbed the girl's wrist, pulling her to her feet. The girl yelped, struggling to keep up with Ino's fast hectic pace. Ino roughly opened one compartment after the other to find an empty. She ignored the startled looks of the other first years, their freezing and their glancing away.

"This one will do," Ino growled and closed the door after them.

She let go of the girl's wrist.

Ino sat down quietly, her school robes pooling on the seat. She looked away from the girl still holding on her uniforms.

"Thank you," the girl said nervously, and her fingers touched the rip. She shook her head, took out her wand and pressed it against the rip. "_Reparo!_"

Out the corner of her eyes, Ino watched as the textile mended itself.

"What's your name?" Ino asked imperiously and pushed back her hair over her shoulder.

"Sakura Haruno," the girl held up her hand, thought better of it, but Ino grabbed her hand. She shook it formally, her eyes piercing through her, more ice than warmth.

Her mere presence crushed her.

"I'm Ino. Yamanaka Ino."

She released her hand, but it remained frozen, suspended in the air.

"You're from... the Yamanaka family," Sakura stammered, brought back her hand to her chest, her cheeks warm.

Ino nodded stiffly, lowering her forehead to the window.

"You're pure blood," Sakura muttered. "Why did you help me?"

"Ambition. That's what makes the House of Slytherin. Not cruelty," Ino replied quietly, her breath white and spinning across the window like a snake.

"Right," Sakura straightened her back. "The History of Hogwarts is actually really interesting when it mentions the founders. They all selected characteristics of what they thought the best witches and wizards should have. It wasn't meant to divide, but to assemble," she inhaled, gulped, and held out her hand, counting on her fingers: "Knowledge, ambition, courage and loyalty. Different sorts of witches and wizard joining forces. That was their true dream."

"Is that right?" Ino asked blankly, and her hand closed around her wrist, so it wouldn't shake.

She pressed herself harder against the window, her forehead prickling from the pressure. She wanted to distance herself from the snake, the boys laughing, the other students not interfering, and Sakura.

Ino accumulated, engulfed house characteristics within her; wasn't she too curious like a Ravenclaw? A tutor would tell her father. Too loyal and protective of the weak like a Hufflepuff? Her mother would snap when she caught Ino feeding the strays. Too brave and reckless like a Gryffindor? Her father's voice would boom in the great hall of their house if she disobeyed him.

What if speaking parseltongue, being a Yamanaka wasn't enough? What if the Sorting Hat decided on sending her to another house?

The snake hissed in her mind, its tail rattling, and Ino snapped back to reality and Sakura still babbling about the History of Hogwarts.

"No..." Ino said aloud, terrified.

"Yeah, surprising isn't?" Sakura had changed into her uniform, and Ino hadn't noticed.

She blinked rapidly. Night had fallen, the magical lamps now illuminating the compartments. Outside, everything was motionless, hidden behind a blanket of thick darkness.

"You'll be Ravenclaw," Ino said.

Sakura blushed.

"I'd like that, actually." She bit her below lip. "Would we be friends then?"

Ino startled, her fists clenching over her skirt. In the window, her reflection quivered, elongated, distorted, fear or loyalty in her widened eyes.

She wanted to say yes.

She needed to say no.

"We'll be rivals," Ino said finally, and she smiled brightly for the first time since she had received her letter from Hogwarts. "We'll be very good rivals," she added with a small laugh that died on her lips.

_Very good friends. _

_Very good rivals. _

Ino never had a real friend before.

* * *

**Slytherin**

"I'm Slytherin," Ino muttered when the sorting hat touched her head.

She shifted on the stool, feeling the eyes of the professors and the students on her like they were picking her mind apart, tossing pieces of her around for all to see. Like they were the ones sorting her.

_Too curious like a Ravenclaw._

_Too loyal like a Hufflepuff._

_Too brave like a Gryffindor._

_**But isn't she a Yamanaka?**_

The weight of the sorting hat was uncomfortable, moving, breathing, pulsing. She closed her eyes, making the void in her head.

"Ahh, occlumency, and so young," the sorting hat's voice buzzed animatedly in her head. "That doesn't work against me though. Slytherin... are you sure, child? You could be in Ravenclaw, I see your thirst for knowledge. Ahh... and your heart leans toward Hufflepuff. And you're impulsive and brave, like a Gryffindor... So peculiar. Nothing is clear."

"I'm Slytherin," she shouted inwardly.

"Yes, yes, but will you thrive there?"

"I have so many ambitions," Ino answered quickly, and the thoughts rolled in her mind, images after images. In control.

"I said mind tricks won't work with me," his voice whipped inside her, and the images she had conjured crumbled away.

A movement of uneasiness swept the room. "_Why is it taking so long?_" Ino opened her eyes, her throat tightening, her heart pounding, deafening in her mind. Sakura was looking at her with confusion, her new Ravenclaw crest gleaming magically on her chest.

Ino held on to the stare.

"Hmmm... Yes, yes... There it is. The fear of being weak."

Aloud, the sorting hat bellowed: "SLYTHERIN!"

The sound of clapping seemed distant to her. Ino approached the Slytherin's table on wobbly legs, smiled weakly at her fellow Slytherins. Older students patted her shoulder, welcoming her.

"You almost scared us. As if the sorting hat could send you anywhere else, Yamanaka. You belong here."

'_I've come home_,' she thought to herself, smiling and nodding to her new friends. '_This is home_,' she thought more forcedly, tricking her own mind, feeling Sakura's hesitant glance over her.

They turned away from each other. The banquet started.

They were rivals now.

* * *

**Ravenclaw**

The dungeon was moist, almost silent, as Professor Ibiki Morino walked across the alleys, scowling at each cauldron.

"Uzumaki, whatever you're doing it's wrong. Start over. It's supposed to be red, not grey!"

Professor Morino hit the back of a Ravenclaw boy with his textbook before slamming back the book on his table. The rows around startled at the sound, hurrying their own manipulations to escape the Professor's cold disdain.

"I catch you sleeping again, Nara, and I'll make you drink the sleeping draught."

Coldly, he surveyed the students of his class, then smirked, the scars running across his face deepening, shifting his face in something inhuman.

"Slytherins... I'll keep you in this dungeon until you stop shaming my good name. And yes, I don't mean our House, I mean _**my**_ name. Get moving, or I'll have to congratulate Haruno again for being able to read better than the rest of you. Punks."

Ino glanced over at what Sakura was doing, craning her neck. She nudged the back of her head, smirking. Sakura stopped chopping the Daisy roots, her whole body freezing. Her partner looked up from her book, with pursued lips.

"Ino..."

"Don't chop it too finely, Forehead girl," Ino sing-sang, blatantly ignoring the urgency in Sakura's tone.

"Ino..." Sakura whispered again, her brows furrowed, as she began chopping more Daisy roots for her Shrinking potion. "Doesn't Kiba look awful nowadays?"

Ino's smirk withered.

Before she could stop herself, she leaned over her table, her head turned toward Kiba and Hinata's table. Hinata was mixing their potion, chewing on her bottom lip, mumbling to herself or talking to Kiba, Ino couldn't be sure. Kiba's head rolled back and forth to look up at his partner, his robes disheveled. His skin gleamed bluish, pale, almost translucent, his neck corded with muscles as if he was holding himself back.

Her heart exploded in her ears.

"Yamanaka," Sasuke hissed to her right and took the Daisy roots from her to drop them in their cauldron. "Stop talking with Haruno and ogling Inuzuka, and concentrate. I'm not failing this class because of you."

Sakura's ears turned red, her knife hesitating, quivering in her grasp before she lowered her head and resumed her chopping.

Still preoccupied, Ino turned three times counterclockwise until the potion darkened, then twice clockwise. It bubbled, red, and Sasuke nodded stiffly, in approval after glancing at his open textbook.

"Did you get the rat spleen?"

"Yeah... I'll prep it now. Crush the caterpillars, please?" She batted her eyelashes at him.

This was home. Sasuke by her side, in the dungeon where they had potion class. Slytherins excelled at potion making and the dark arts, she recited inwardly like a mantra. Her glance drifted two more times toward Kiba.

He looked half-beastly, barely responsive.

His knee bounced, his fingers drummed on the table behind them. His tie to the colours of Hufflepuff was loosened around his neck, crooked, over his untucked shirt.

"Yamanaka," Sasuke snapped, and added the rat spleen, then the caterpillars in their cauldron.

Mechanically, Ino handed Sasuke the rest of the ingredients with a strident giggle. She recited the next steps, her voice high and bubbly.

Sakura's shoulders tensed, and Ino knew she had flinched.

Their rivalry drained, alienated them. They competed at everything, and Ino could never let her guard down. Good rivals faced each other on the quidditch field, tore each other over boys, savagely compared each other's grades. It left little place for anything else. There was always Sasuke to impress, a snitch to be caught under the rain and thunder.

At the end of the class, Ino trailed behind Sasuke, then slowed down looking back over her shoulder. She bit her lip. She _needed_ to know.

Grinning at Ino, Sakura filled the increasing gap between Sasuke and her. She barely noticed. She barely reacted. They went up the stairs toward Transfiguration, along with the other Slytherin and Ravenclaw students. They moved in two distinct groups, talking among themselves. Sakura was the only one crossing the clear division between the two houses. The two other houses headed toward flying class, chatting animatedly, no clear division between them.

Hufflepuff welcomed everyone. Slytherin did not.

Ino waited a little longer, but Kiba didn't emerge from the class.

Biting her below lip, Ino raced up the stairs. At the end of the hallway, Sakura's delicate voice echoed as she bombarded Sasuke with questions he barely acknowledged.

She truly needed to know what was happening to Kiba, and somehow she had thought Sakura would feel the same way. The real Ravenclaw of the two.

Ino waited in the hallway behind a pillar.

She watched as Hinata's head appeared, her pale eyes searching the hallway before she slowly pushed the door open and stepped outside. She held her textbook to her chest, her body bent with nervous energy, her head thrown back. Her mouth moved, but Ino couldn't hear what she said.

Hinata raced down the hallway toward flying class.

Ino pressed herself against the wall as Hinata passed by her.

Kiba didn't appear.

She closed her eyes, taking out her wand from her pocket.

"_Legilimens!_" she whispered.

His mind coiled her in, dark.

Swiftly, it turned bright white, dancing curtains caught in the moonlight, a bottomless cauldron, and she sank into it. It brushed against her, silk and velvet, and her heart beat faster. It was too quiet. Then, something roared in the distance. Ino turned her head, fear exploding in her heart: '_What _**is**_ that?_' A pattering of steps flaked moist earth and grass, dampened, but shaking the entire structure of his mind.

She was in a forest without leaves.

The misshapen shadow roared again closer, heavy steps clawing toward her. Ino tried to pull her mind away, but she was trapped in fur, spit and the howl of a wolf.

She breathed, she heard, she saw, she tasted nothing but the wolf and its forest. She ran, closing her mind, trying to peel it off the animal.

She blinked. Time slowed.

The wolf was already sitting on her chest. Severed pieces of his mind tugged at her. She gasped. Claws sank into her, moist rotten breath caressing her neck.

With difficulty, she detached herself from his mind.

Ino tumbled back, holding herself against the wall. Her temples dripped with sweat.

Her hand shook over her bloodied mouth. Her eyes brimmed with tears.

He was a werewolf.

In her head, the snake showed fangs.

'_A__ new rival_,' it hissed.

* * *

**Gryffindor**

The snake wriggling in her mind hissed its loudest when she was in the abandoned girl's bathroom on the second floor.

"_Depulso!_"

The ghost howled, hit in the chest by Ino's charm, and plunged back into a toilet. The door of the stall slammed back close.

Ino panted, her wand still held up, the charm she had performed to banish the ghost still illuminating its tip. Sakura turned back toward her, her hands pressed against her ears, her eyes widening.

"What's wrong with you lately?" Sakura hissed, and she cocked her head listening for hurried steps and someone coming to see what was the racket about. "Oh my god, we'll lose so many points if we are found out after curfew. Couldn't you be a little more careful?"

"What? You prefer her howling around maybe? Yeah, that would be so subtle..." Ino snapped as she pocketed her wand.

_Impulsive and reckless like a Gryffindor. _

Her hand trembling faintly, but her mind was clear and firm, building a wall against the snake.

'_When a rival is down, you destroy him_,' it cooed.

'_When a friend is down, you help him back up,_' Ino yelled inwardly, and she definitely shut the snake out.

"So what are we doing?" Sakura asked reluctantly.

Ino's face gleamed with sweat, her features harsher than usual in resolve and in fright. Sakura looked down at her satchel, unsettled.

Silently, Ino unpacked the ingredients and two cauldrons.

There was the snake, and there was the wolf. She chose the wolf for now.

Sakura muttered the name of the ingredients to herself. They were expensive, rare. She had only briefly seen them in Professor Morino's private collection. She blanched, realization damning on her. _Wolfsbane_. Kiba and his disheveled appearance. '_Could it be?_'

"Where the hell did you get this?" Sakura stammered and ran a hand through her hair. Restlessly, her mind spun with questions and theories: _Where did he get bit? Would he get kicked out of school? Did Professor Senju know?_

"I stole it from Professor Morino's private collection," Ino said unflinchingly.

"You're insane!" Sakura breathed out, narrowing her eyes, and she shook her head. She shook her head, refusing the possibility nudging at her.

"You don't like our little contest? It's a hard potion to make. I thought it would be an appropriate challenge for us," Ino replied sweetly, but her smirk floated over her lips, and her eyes pierced through her, both desperate and unyielding. "But maybe you forfeit?"

Sakura's own smirk mirrored hers, distant, unconvinced. Her heartbeat quickened as she reached for one of the cauldron. The metal clinked when she set it carefully over the cauldron base.

"No way I'm losing to you, Pig," she said as firmly as she could muster.

They stared at each other, over their respective cauldron. They had neatly divided the ingredients between them. Sakura chewed on her bottom lip. She faltered.

Impatiently, Ino flipped her hair over her shoulder and reached for the first ingredient.

"Come on, Sakura. Don't lose to me," Ino grinned.

Ino never left her fall back.

Sakura thought about their first encounter aboard the Hogwarts Express. Her hair had shone, a golden mane, and she remembered thinking, on the ground, unable to stand up again: '_I wish I was as strong as her_.'

Sakura nodded stiffly, her hand reaching for the first ingredient. '_Ino... Thank you._'

* * *

_**By the way, yes, I know that Potion was a class shared between two Houses, but I like to redefine things that don't suit me. :P**_

_**Feedback, comments, and random key smashing are all welcome in the comment section! Teehee!**_

_**Happy magic week everyone!**_


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